Arts

For New Year’s Eve in Homer, bars celebrate in two time zones: New York style at 8 p.m., with a live television broadcast of the ball dropping at Times Square, or at local time at midnight. From East End Road to the end of the road, revelers have a choice of celebrations from the raucous to the sedate.

Former Pier One Theatre director Lance Petersen has received the Governor’s Awards for the Arts and Humanities for individual artist.

The Alaska Humanities Forum and the Alaska State Council on the Arts announced the recipients earlier this month.

The Governor’s Awards for the Arts and Humanities is an annual partnership between the Alaska Humanities Forum, the Alaska State Council on the Arts (ASCA), the Alaska Arts and Culture Foundation, and the Office of the Governor to recognize and honor noteworthy contributions to the arts and humanities in Alaska.

Homer will get a Christmas morning treat when CBS broadcasts a holiday special with the Kilcher family. “Holiday Homecoming with Jewel” features Homer’s famous musical star, Jewel Kilcher, her aunt Mossy Kilcher, and some of the stars of the Discovery Channel reality TV show, “Alaska: The Last Frontier” — Jewel’s dad Atz Kilcher, Bonnie Dupree, Eve and Eivin Kilcher, and Nikos Kilcher. The special airs locally at 9 a.m. Dec. 25 on KTVA Channel 11. The show features singing with Jewel, Atz Kilcher, Dupree, Mossy Kilcher and Jewel’s 5-year-old son, Kase.

Among cultural institutions in Homer, the Pratt Museum has pioneered a unique spot. As a museum of natural history, history, culture and art, its exhibits often connect those aspects of the Pratt’s collections. “Inspired by Diaries,” on exhibit through Dec. 29, asked artists to create works in contemplation of diaries and journals in the museum’s collection or those of the artists. The show also bridges literary heritage and visual art.

Ninilchik resident Mike Chihuly has lived enough lives to write several books since moving to Alaska more than 60 years ago. Instead, he packed them all into one.

Chihuly’s book, “Alaska Fish and Fire,” was published in August and released in October. It catalogs Chihuly’s life experiences from growing up in Alaska and working on the state Board of Fisheries to his time spent on the Agulowak River and working as the chief of Ninilchik Emergency Services.

“I probably should have written two or three books,” he said of the broad range of topics covered in the memoir.

Watercolor artist Jan Peyton does a demonstration from 2-4:30 p.m. Saturday at Fireweed Gallery. She will show techniques like wet-on-wet painting and how to add pigment to wet areas to create a translucent effect. The demonstration is free.

The Friends of the Homer Public Library presents its third Homer Big Read. The focus of the community read will be Thornton Wilder’s books “The Bridge of San Luis Rey” and “Our Town.” Together the community will examine the themes of the books, including how communities and individuals make sense of tragedy, what it means to make a life in a small town, how to seize the day, and the continued importance of reading and literature in a well-examined life.

Several times a week, youth services librarian Claudia Haines holds Storytime in the Homer Public Library’s Joy Griffin Children’s Room. For ages 3-5 and 2 and younger, Haines reads books, sings songs and holds games, all with the goal of forming literacy — and inspiring children with the joy of reading.

Homer might be as cold as Moscow this winter, but when it comes to the annual production of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker, citizens, we’re not talking the Bolshoi Ballet. At the end of the road, and now in its 28th year, the Cosmic Hamlet’s production can be a bit, well, unusual. That’s part of the charm that makes Homer Nutcracker Productions’ version not a cookie-cutter Nutcracker.

Homer Connections students who are taking an art course this semester — painting, drawing, ceramics, photography, printmaking or digital art — share their work at the Homer Connections First Friday K-12 Art Show. Appetizers, coffee and hot cocoa will be provided.

Art lovers can add a new venue to their art walk on First Friday: a show of art created by Homer Connections students from classes they’ve taken this semester. Homeschooled students who took art classes this semester show their work from 3-4 p.m. Friday at All Hopped Up Espresso on West Pioneer Avenue.

The Homer Council on the Arts annual Nutcracker Faire runs 11 a.m.-7:30 p.m. Saturday and noon-6 p.m. Sunday in the Homer High School Commons and gym. The faire features artists and crafters selling local, handmade gifts, food, live music and from 1-3 p.m. both days, a visit from Santa Claus. The Nutcracker Ballet also opens at 3 p.m. Saturday in the Mariner Theatre.

The Homer Public Library is a 2016 Star Library in the annual ranking of U.S. public libraries by Library Journal. In its index of Public Library Service, Homer Public Library is one of only 260 libraries to receive the highest rankings from the prestigious publication for the U.S. library community. This is the fifth time HPL has been named a Star Library in the nine-year history of the index.

Poet Peggy Shumaker and her husband Joe Usibelli announced they would like to name the Storyknife main house after poet, writer and teacher Eva Saulitis. The cost of the house is $250,000, and Shumaker and Usibelli will match every dollar donated two-to-one.

Saulitis died in 2016 of breast cancer. A teacher at Kachemak Bay Campus and the Kachemak Bay Writers Conference, Saulitis wrote several books of poetry, a memoir, “Into Great Silence,” and a series of essays about dying, “Becoming Earth.”

“Homestead Kitchen” was born out of the same kind of connection that started the Kilcher family’s reality television show — a Facebook message to Eivin Kilcher.

“Alaska: The Last Frontier,” the Discovery channel show that made the Kilchers a family name known in households across the United States, had been on for about three years when a literary agent reached out to Eivin and asked if there was interest in writing a book. Coincidentally, he and his wife Eve had tossed the idea around of writing a cookbook around before, so they pitched it.

Artist Barbara Lavallee visits the Art Shop Gallery from 1-6 p.m. Saturday. She will be available to personalize and sign calendars, prints and books. Call the gallery at 235-7076 to have items signed if unable to make the visit.

“Windows,” this month’s solo exhibit by Felicity Jones at the Homer Council on the Arts, expands on the idea of a traditional art show. While many exhibits feature art carefully hung on walls, Jones, 17, presents her art as if you’d walked into a living room. A large window stands at the front of the gallery, with empty picture frames and other windows lying on the floor or hung on walls. Sculpture stands hold Sculpy clay figurines. Pen-and-ink drawings dominate the show.

The Pratt Museum’s Inspired by Diaries exhibit opens with a reception from 5-7 p.m. Friday. Have you ever kept a diary or journal? Had the opportunity to peruse the personal writing of your ancestors?

Several diaries and journals are held in the collections of the Pratt Museum. Their stories range from weather reports and moose sightings to extended narrative and personal reflection. Often the written word leaves much to be imagined, and can serve as a jumping-off point for something more.

Slide into your 50s, and sometimes things you put aside years ago don’t look as bad as you might have thought. That’s the perspective legendary folk singer John Gorka gained recently when he took a look at an album he recorded in 1985 at age 27 with producer Jim Rooney at Cowboy Jack Clements’ studio in Nashville, Tenn. Backed by a full band, Gorka recorded the album in five days — and then he shelved it.